Eklent Kaçi (born January 29, 1999), also known as Klenti Kaçi is an Albanian professional

pool Pool may refer to: Bodies of water * Swimming pool, usually an artificial structure containing a large body of water intended for swimming * Reflecting pool, a shallow pool designed to reflect a structure and its surroundings * Tide pool, a roc ...

player. Kaçi won the

WPA World Ten-ball Championship The WPA World Ten-ball Championship is a professional ten-ball Pool (cue sports), pool tournament sanctioned by the World Pool-Billiard Association (WPA). The event was first held in 2008 in the Philippines, followed by playings there in 2009 and ...

in 2021 and 2023 and reached the semi-finals of the 2017 WPA World Nine-ball Championship and final of the 2024 WPA World Nine-ball Championship. He has been the top-ranked player in the world of

9-ball Nine-ball (sometimes written 9-ball) is a discipline of the cue sport pool. The game's origins are traceable to the 1920s in the United States. It is played on a rectangular billiard table with at each of the four corners and in the middle of e ...

pool.

Career

Kaçi started playing pool at the age of eight. He has won the Albanian Snooker championships in addition to national pool championships, even though he never played snooker prior to his Federation asking him to join the event. Kaçi made his first European championship in 2013, for

ten-ball Ten-ball is a rotation pool game similar to nine-ball, but using ten balls instead of nine, and with the 10 ball instead of the 9 as the "". Although the game has existed since the early 1960s, its popularity has risen since the early 2000s as a ...

, qualifying for the main knockout, and being eliminated in the round of 64. In 2017, Kaçi made the semi-finals of the 2017 WPA World Nine-ball Championship, losing 11–6 to Roland Garcia. The following year, at 18 years of age, Kaçi won the Aramith Masters, and became world number one later that year. At the 2018 WPA World Nine-ball Championship, Kaçi (as world number 1), lost to 17-year-old Robbie Capito 11–10 in the last 32. Kaçi won two events on the

Euro Tour The Euro Tour is a series of professional pool events set around Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlanti ...

, reaching Euro Tour number one in 2018. He won the

2018 Treviso Open The Dynamic Billard Treviso Open 2018 (sometimes known as the 2018 Italy Open) was the sixth and final Euro Tour 9-Ball pool event in 2018. The event was won by Russia's Fedor Gorst who defeated Poland's Mateusz Śniegocki 9–7 in the final. T ...

, and the following season the 2019 Austria Open. In June 2024 Kaçi reached the final of the

WPA World Nine-ball Championship The WPA World Nine-ball Championship is an annual professional nine-ball pool tournament contested since 1990. The championship is sanctioned by the World Pool Association (WPA) and principally sponsored and organized by Matchroom Sport, who pro ...

Jeddah Jeddah ( ), alternatively transliterated as Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; , ), is a List of governorates of Saudi Arabia, governorate and the largest city in Mecca Province, Saudi Arabia, and the country's second largest city after Riyadh, located ...

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in West Asia. Located in the centre of the Middle East, it covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries ...

, but was defeated by Fedor Gorst. In October 2024 Kaçi was part of the European team that were defeated by Asia in the inaugural

Reyes Cup The Reyes Cup is an annual nine-ball pool tournament contested between teams representing Asia and Europe. Similar in format to the Mosconi Cup, the inaugural event was held in Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, during October 2024 and ...

held in the

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

Career titles

* 2025 McDermott Open Nine-ball * 2024

Mosconi Cup The Mosconi Cup is an annual nine-ball pool tournament contested since 1994 between teams representing Europe and the United States. Named after American pool player Willie Mosconi, the event is comparable to the Ryder Cup in golf and the We ...

* 2023

* 2023 U.K. Open Nine-ball Championship * 2021

* 2021

* 2021 Predator Austria Open Ten-ball * 2021 Albanian Amateur Snooker Championship * 2020

* 2020 Stella Artois Open International Nine-ball * 2019

European Pool Championship European Pool Championship (also called Dynamic European Championships) is a pool competition organized by the European Pocket Billiard Federation (EPBF). The tournament is held annually since 1980. It should not be confused with the series of sma ...

Eight-Ball * 2019

Austria Open * 2019 American Straight Pool Championship * 2018 Albanian Amateur Snooker Championship * 2018

Treviso Open * 2017 World Pool Series Aramith Masters * 2017 Predator Grand Finale * 2016 Albanian Amateur Snooker Championship

References

External links

Eklent Kaçi at AZBilliards
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaçi, Eklent 1999 births Living people Albanian pool players WPA World Ten-ball Champions